'Third point in the revolution': Syrian Kurds carve out an enclave between the Assad regime and the rebels

Syrian Kurds carve out an enclave between the Assad regime and rebels

Derik, Syria — As the civil war in Syria grinds on, one of the less-noticed developments has been the emergence of a de facto Kurdish autonomous area in the country’s northeast.

Stretching across a chain of towns and villages, from the border with Iraq to the disputed town of Sere Kaniyeh (Ras al-Ain in Arabic), this Kurdish-ruled region is seeking to carve out an enclave between regime and rebels.

Its inhabitants are opposed to the Assad regime, which brutally suppressed their aspirations over the last decades. At the same time, they are also deeply suspicious of the ambitions and intentions of Turkish-backed Islamist rebels.

The Kurdish creation of an autonomous zone has not gone unnoticed by the Syrian rebels. A key objective of the largely Sunni rebellion is to maintain the country’s territorial integrity.

The result is an emerging civil war within a civil war.

Rebel groups, apparently backed by Turkey, have clashed with Kurdish fighters in Sere Kaniyeh. An uneasy ceasefire is now in force, but few expect the last word has been said on the matter.

The Kurdish-ruled zone is situated in one of the most fertile areas of Syria, once known as its breadbasket. It is also home to most of the country’s oil reserves, making it a prize to be fought over by both regime and rebels.

There is little good news coming out of Syria these days. But the Syrian Kurds, one of the region’s most oppressed minorities, looked as if they were quietly carving out a safe zone for themselves amid the chaos when I travelled to the area in late February.

I wanted to see if this was, in fact, so, to assess the chances of the area’s long-term survival, and to ask what this might mean for the future of Syria as a whole.

I entered Syria “illegally,” accompanying a squad of Kurdish Popular Protection Units (YPG) militia fighters across the Iraqi border.

The YPG is a force trained by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has been battling for autonomy in eastern Turkey for decades and constitutes the sole military factor in the Kurdish autonomous zone in north-east Syria.

We arrived in Derik (Malkiyeh in Arabic), a town of 26,000 and one of the main centres of the Kurdish autonomous zone. The last regime security forces were expelled in November.

I spent the next two days in Derik, observing the process whereby for the first time a functioning Kurdish apparatus of government was being created.

The old headquarters of the political security branch of President Bashar al-Assad’s intelligence services is now the headquarters of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), the PKK-aligned movement which dominates the Syrian Kurdish autonomous zone. Flanking the building are two new PYD-sponsored facilities, a centre for Kurdish “revolutionary youth” and a women’s centre.

The de facto domination of the PYD is the most immediately notable aspect of Derik.

“The Kurds are with neither the regime nor the Free Army,” explained Talat Yunis, 35, a PYD leader and primary school teacher.

“The Kurds are a third point in the revolution.”

And what was the ultimate goal of this self-organization? I asked. Did his party seek independence, to split off from Syria?

“The Kurds want self-government, but in the context of the Syrian nation,” he replied.

“Any new government will have to accept self-rule in Kurdish areas — self-government, but within a democratic Syria.”

Mr. Yunis made it sound easy. But many people in Derik also seemed optimistic, making this appear plausible.

Under Mr. Assad, Kurdish was repressed in all its forms. Kurds were unable to speak their language outside their homes, study their culture or give their children Kurdish names.

Now, in the cultural centre in Derik, with the picture of Mr. Assad removed from the entrance, a play in Kurdish was taking place in the main hall. The sound of the tanbur, a Kurdish stringed instrument, rang out from an adjoining room, as a group of men practised Kurdish folk dancing.

But there are some shadows. Not everyone welcomes the PYD’s dominant role in the governance of the Kurdish areas. While officially, a Kurdish “supreme committee,” bringing together the PYD with other smaller parties, is the governing body, everyone knows the PYD’s armed strength and mobilization ensure it is the sole true ruler.

For some local Kurds not affiliated with the PYD, this is a problem. One young woman said the party repressed voices other than its own, and had elevated “uneducated” people to positions of power that they were abusing.

A broader problem is that both sides in the civil war — the Assad regime and the Sunni Arab rebels — are opposed to the PYD’s existence.

The Assad regime has largely abandoned northern Syria, and will probably never return. The rebels, on the other hand, are the new power in the region.

Sere Kaniyeh is the point where the rival ambitions of Sunni rebels and Kurds collide. Twice — in November and mid-January — fighting broke out in the town as the rebels sought to push their way in.

At Sere Kaniyeh, I met YPG fighters and commanders at a front-line position.

There is an eerie atmosphere in the town. Almost all civilians have fled and large areas have been devastated by the fighting. Burnt-out buildings, debris, walls pock-marked by bullet holes mark the front-line area.

The front line runs through the town. Islamist rebels of the Jabhat al-Nusra and Ghuraba al-Sham groups still hold two neighbourhoods, Yusuf al-Azma and Sumud, constituting about 10% of the town.

Jamshid Osman, a YPG commander, is convinced the two rounds of fighting in January and November were part of a coordinated effort to destroy the area of Kurdish self-rule.

Mr. Osman, in his late 20s and wearing an incongruous Russian-style military cap, has become well-known throughout the Kurdish area because of the prominent role he and his men took in the fighting in Sere Kaniyeh.

“The [Syrian] Free Army took money from the Turkish government to fight in Sere Kaniyeh,” he said at a house near the front line.

“Sere Kaniyeh is the first phase. They want to go on to Derik and Rumeilan and take the gasoline and oil there.”

This Kurdish suspicion of a Turkish-Islamist plan to snuff out the emerging self-rule area is widespread.

It has some logic to it, and some evidence. The Islamist attackers seem to have come from across the Turkish border and used a Turkish hospital to treat their wounded.

Few on the Kurdish side expect the ceasefire in Sere Kaniyeh to hold. As for their ambitions for “western Kurdistan,” Mr. Osman said, “We’ll fight anyone who wants to make us slaves.”

His words should be taken seriously. The YPG has had the best of its encounters with the Sunni rebels so far.

As Syria fragments, old ethnic and sectarian loyalties are coming to the fore. This trend plays to the advantages of the Kurds, who have a more strongly developed sense of identity than other population groups.

They can also draw on Kurdish political formations outside the country — most importantly, the PKK and Massoud Barzani’s Kurdish Regional Government in northern Iraq.

The Syrian civil war may yet last a long time, but the Kurdish position is clear.

Said a young student in Derik: “We don’t want the regime on our lands — and we don’t want the Free Syrian Army either.”

This desire to preserve autonomy and a measure of quiet amid the chaos of civil war is entirely understandable. Of course, the insanity now gripping Syria may prevent this ambition from coming to fruition.

But to witness the YPG fighters on the frontline in Sere Kaniyeh, and the organizers and activists in Derik is to see a people who have ended their silence. Any attempt to return them to it is bound to be strongly resisted.